Local Sizzler franchisee selling restaurants

Advertiser Staff

After a nearly 20-year on-and-off run operating Sizzler restaurants in Hawai'i, the local Sallee family has decided to sell the five franchised eateries on O'ahu.

The Hawai'i restaurants employ 174 workers.

Gary Sallee, president of Sizzler Restaurants of Hawai'i, said he has been talking to a couple of local companies about acquiring the franchise, and will market the restaurants through a broker if necessary.

Sallee's parents, Betty and Frank, opened the first Hawai'i Sizzler in 1964 on Nimitz Highway. The family expanded and sold the franchise to a California firm in the '70s, then reacquired eight Sizzler restaurants out of bankruptcy in 1997, refurbishing the eateries and closing three locations.

But after his parents died in the past two years, Gary Sallee and his wife, Carol, wanted to get out of the business, and their three sons were not interested in continuing it.

"It's time for somebody to step in and go to the next step," he said. "We're just tired."

Sallee said franchisor Sizzler USA, which owns and operates 65 of its 246 restaurants nationwide, prefers to have a franchisee for the five Hawai'i restaurants, which he said collectively bring in about $10 million in annual revenue.